Archive for the ‘Personal’ Category

Shopping!

Tuesday, February 16th, 2010

To my profound delight I discovered a long-forgotten £20 note in a pair of trousers yesterday, and so decided to treat myself to Nice New Shiny Things.

Most of you will not have experienced the delight of shopping with me. It is a curious thing. I do not buy things lightly (for myself. I can easily burn through thousands on pointless crap for other people) and generally take a very long time to decide on anything. What generally happens is I will have one thing I *know* I want, and several others I kind of want but non-specifically. Like shoes.

Today’s shopping trip I wanted Before They Are Hanged, and pleasant clothing. Preferably of the footwear variety, with thin soles. This involved a run around the usual Newington charity shops (where I found abolutely nothing, but did bump (literally) into an old collegue who had made vague attempts to ask me out a few months back. It was lovely to see her but no suggestions of further meetings were made).

Then to a cheap shoeshop where I saw light footwear I did like quite a lot, and will probably go back for when I have slightly more money. They were an extravagant £9.99. I wonder if they’ll be any good for running?

Back to Forbidden Planet where I did not buy Dodgem Logic, Hellblazer or Fables. All the stuff I wanted in the book sale – including the much desired Evil for Evil – is now gone. To the Library!!!! I had forgotten the joys of Library. I am not a member though and thus felt bloody uncomfortable being there and left without asking about voluntary things. I had heard there’s an archeology group that meets there, which I want to join. Perhaps another time.

So then to Waterstones where I discovered a new edition of Before They Are Hanged. Excelent! Except that it does not match my copy of The Blade Itself. I have the bigger one with lovely blood-spattered cover all in lower case letters. Damnation!! I decided to check other bookstores to see if the matching volume was available. [yes I am an utter pain in the arse to shop with]. The branch on George St also did not have the right edition but did gave some nice 3 for 2 offers, not including anything I specifically wanted. To the West End!!

Which is where I buy most of my new books. They didn’t have the right one either (double damnation!!!) but the new one on 3 for 2. What 3 to buy?? The easy options would be Evil for Evil and Under Red Skies, but they weren’t on offer. I hunted for a good hour for another two books, eventually (after vast amounts of indecision) going for Vlad by C.C. Humphreys and Twelve by Jasper Kent. Look them up. Yeah, I’m getting back into vamp fiction thank you Charlie Huston.

Then, oh glorious glory, a call from Scottish Hydroelectric about a job harrassing people for money. Huzzah!!! I am all about renewables so do genuinely want this job. I can hardly hear a bloody thing though for all the traffic, and duff the phone interview up a bit. I’m told there’s a follow up interview at 5, if I don’t get a call then I fail.
There follows a round of email to Andrew then a call to ex-wife. I discover I’m soaked and fucking freezing so I head ‘home’ and start reading.

Before They Are Hanged is better than The Blade Itself, and includes some super passages explaining the world history. It all makes a lot more sense, 150 pages in. Glokta remains by far the best character I’ve read in years

Tonight is unusually quiet so I might get some proper sleep

G’night

S

Ps. I did not get the Hydro job

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Losing (track/time/space/causality)

Saturday, February 13th, 2010

Days pass. Temporal law, immutable. And so we live until we don’t. That’s the journey. If we are fortunate that is happier than not and more filling than empty. Or something.

I am very bad at spare time. While I do not object to my own company it is [I have found much to my own surprise] much easier with someone else to frustrate or be frustrated by. I am generally a negative person, with great manic bursts whenever I have an excuse to throw energy at someone. Everything I do is at someone, never just for itself or for me. I can’t do that here. For all the men in the building I have to be alone. I have to just be me, for me.

This is beginning to be a good thing. There are things, exercises I know I should do every day. I’ve known them for years but never commited. I am now doing then. I actually kinda like it. It reminds me of the tales of Shaolin Monks stretching for hours a day purely because sitting in contemplation made their muscles atrophie. Thus they became warriors by default, greatly assisted by fleeing Generals who came to beg sanctuary.
Except i’m not a monk or a general. I’m just a guy who watched his life fall apart.

I find now I’m more aware of the frequent conversations I have with myself. Actual full conversations, often with multiple participants. Vocal. I do not care if people can hear and think it strange. I found myself in full flow in the ScotMid in Leith, noticed a group of people I kept coincidentally bumping into, who gave me warm smiles as I quietly ranted away, frowning.

I have almost finished The Blade Itself. Truly the best book I’ve read in years. I am surprised that my favourite character is a crippled torturer. We follow his thoughts through the book (he is one of 3 core characters) and his level of honest intelligence is very refreshing – even if he does have to BS purely for his contemptable superiors. I never learned to do that. Anyway, great book. I hope I can afford the sequel.

S

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GAH [and more things]

Friday, February 12th, 2010

UTTER FUCKING COCK. I just accidentally lost several pages of update. Bastard.
11.2.10
Today is JobCentre day. Up I get for brekkie as usual. I hit the centre a bit early and trawl the crappy touchscreens for anything that looks plausable. The man at the desk looks embarrased at the sheer number of things I’ve applied for that are noted ’stuff I don’t have required’ or ’no reply’. He checks out my selections and pointlessly adds several of his own. We briefly discuss my life, he smiles and says helpful things. I leave.

Armed with my wide variety of employment printouts I get back on the bike and head into town. Or Not. I get to the top of Leith Walk before realizing I have nowhere to go. I’ve been asked to stay away from Bread Street and there isn’t anywhere else. I have no friends I know would welcome me in, I can’t afford buy a coffee and just relax, or to go charity shopping. There are no places to just go and hang out without purpose. So I turn around and head back to the B&B, and from there get applying.

If you’ve never tried it, please know that jobhunting with an iPhone on an iffy 3G connection is unpleasant. The device itself is wonderful, and can to things I would not have dreamed of only 5 years ago. But trying to fill in application forms online is a soul destroying experience. Of the 10+ jobs I have to apply for, two of them provide useable phone numbers [no replies yet], four send me to online forms and the rest require qualifications I don’t have. [I only discover this later]. It’s amazing how many jobs don’t advertise their essential qualififcations. So some 4 hours later I have [I think] applied for some jobs. Assuming the web forms got through. That done I get gather myself to go to Ainsley Park for their Early Bird position.

I ask at the reception desk. A vague looking woman shouts at her supervisor until he pays attention, then declares that it’s online only ‘No it isn’t’ I reply ‘the online link leads to a PDF which is read-only and thus useless without a printer, which I do not have’ ‘Oh’ she says ‘ Do you have the undeclared but essential poolside certificate thingumy that you must have for this job’ ‘No I do not,’ I reply ‘nor did I know I needed it. Shall I simply leave, then, given that I cannot possibly get the job that your advertising department did not disclose essential information for?’. ‘Oh’ she said. I left.

Back to my old flat, where I unboxed my very large tea collection into a plastic bag, along with rather a lot of DVDs. Not all of them, annoyingly. I also did not have space for my coffee or tea pots. I fail at packing.

Then down to Daughters, where I left the DVDs [much to her mothers annoyance]. I then had a walk to Farmfoods with Daughter and ex-wife, which was pleasant enough. When we got back to their flat there was an interesting discussion, in which ex-wife expressed her concern that some people find her cheerfulness disturbing. I agreed that sometimes her overly joyful demeanor is actively oppressive. I simply cannot keep up, and this is the cause of occasional mild psychological trauma. But she is happy, she explains. She has everything she wants in life, and cannot pretend to be miserable when she is not.

Would I not be happy, she asks, if I was married to Wioleta and living in a nice house with our children and a well paid job? Oddly this question depresses me beyond any manner I could have remotely expected, and I leave shortly afterwards, carefully making no further comments.

I get back to B&B and attempt to watch Prophecy, but the video is tiny and I give up [forced letterboxing to about 4"] and read The Blade Itself instead, while posting gubbins to Twitter and FaceBook. I do get some nice messages from Alisdair, Andrew and Fergus, which is cheering. I may actually see some people I know in the near future!! UNfortunately Fergus has not given me contact details so I will not see him tonight. Damn.

S

Posted in Books, Homeless, Jobhunting, Personal | 5 Comments »

Homeless. Day 4

Monday, February 8th, 2010

7.2.10 4:30 am
I’m wired. Sleep is a foreign planet I only get to witness in shiny scifi art books. I feel like utter crap and everything itches. I think my scalp is falling off in 10,000 little chunks. I need a shower so very very badly. I read for a while but my eyes are still burning from too much mandarin oil yesterday. Note: use less oil in the burners.
There’s still some food lurking around on the floor so I munch away. I have a cup as well, so I can have cups of tea rather than dunking a teabag in the kettle and risking death by drinking from the kettle. Life is fun when you have to find disgusting new ways to survive.

(more…)

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Homeless day 3

Monday, February 8th, 2010

6.2.10

There is a loud snorer next door. This, after Eben, is painful. My hearing is particularly acute anyway, but now my evil brain actively hunts for snoring because I’m so used to being kept awake by it. So I was awake at 3:30am, and that was that. Got some decent reading in [The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie, which is thoroughly brilliant].

Rain started to thump down, which played a gentle tune on the skylight [no windows on the walls]. Sounds lovely, very relaxing. Until the git in the other room [the not-snoring side] decided to play very loud music at 6:30am. In fairness he’s blatant about it and the music isn’t too bad. Not stuff I know, but not offensively pop. And not fucking ABBA, for which I am profoundly grateful.

(more…)

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Homeless Day 2

Saturday, February 6th, 2010

5.1.2010

Breakfast at 9. Got into my usual cycling gear [heading to the Shiatsu Centre for 10]. Walking into the shared dining area felt awful. Just miserably embarrassing. I also *hate* eating with company. It’s one of the things I never ever do by choice. I don’t have many choices right now. So…

Resisting the urge to sit alone, I took a seat beside a couple of scruffy looking men, one young and one old. The old man attempted to be a comedian, and his efforts were genuinely comedic. I liked him.

(more…)

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Homeless. Day 1 [last night]

Friday, February 5th, 2010

Moved into homeless accommodation in Leith. It’s basically a room with a bed and a sink. There’s a small chest of drawers and a built in cupboard. And a very small TV. I never watch TV.

I called my ex-wife to let her know I’d arrived safely, posted updates on Twitter and FaceBook, and spent half an hour trying very hard not to cry. Read a book for a while, then called Wioleta, and had to explain why getting a job now may not be the best plan. She sounded confused and disappointed, which is hardly surprising. Not least because she’s right.

No cooking appliances meant no food. No cup meant very little to drink [had to pour water into a kettle then drink from the kettle]. So I went to sleep at about 7pm, woke up again at 3am ish and spend the rest of the night waiting for morning to come.

More on today later.

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an update

Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010

For the [maybe] three people who follow this site rather than facebook or twitter, I will be homeless in a few days.

I’ve made attempts at finding work, hampered brutally by the huge chunks of money I knew I’d lose the instant I became employed. I have failed to find alternative, affordable accommodation. There are no – and I really do mean *no* – one or two bedroom DSS flats available anywhere in the city, or remotely close to it. So on Thursday morning a Council van will be coming to collect my worldly belongings and place them in secure storage. Anything I want to keep available will be going to my Daughters place for safety + access. I will pack one bag with essentials and take that to the emergency housing office, who will ship me off to a B&B, location to be decided on the hour. I will probably be there for 6 months, which is the minimum reasonable time I can expect to wait for a council flat to become available.

This is the endgame. As of Thursday afternoon I will be legally homeless, short of miraculously finding somewhere to live tomorrow.

As such it is deeply unlikely I will me able to maintain this site on anything resembling a regular basis.
I will remain contactable at undeadbydawn@mac.com [email and facebook], @undeadbydawn on twitter and on my mobile number, 07891920089

any further details I’ll give as and when I can.

Take care, kids

S x

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C[o/u]rses!

Thursday, January 7th, 2010

I went to Telford College yesterday and applied for the HND Civil Engineering course. Mostly because it’s all they had that looked remotely interesting. I then made my way home asking myself ‘Is that really what I want to do, or did I just apply because it’s there?’

I applied because it’s there. That’s it. Not that I have any *objections* to Civil Engineering at all, nope I do not. I would very happily be a civil engineer. It’s a bloody good and very important job. But

(more…)

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Meanwhile

Friday, December 25th, 2009

I’m lagging way behind on posting intentions, mostly due to having brief oases of calm amid a shitstorm of fucked-offness. I never fare well this time of year, and this one is an absolute stinker.

I have had two good days with Daughter though, which has been much required and very nice indeed.

So, things to come:

(more…)

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